The long and illustrious career of Fedor Emelianenko (33-4) reportedly will come to a close in just a month.

The 35-year-old fighter told Russian television outlet isport.ua his recently announced June 21 fight with Pedro Rizzo (19-9) will be the final one before his retirement.

The former PRIDE champion and recent Strikeforce fighter said the time was right.

“It will be the last fight of my career,” Emelianenko said. “It’s time to end my career.”

The June 21 event is held in conjunction with M-1 Global at the Ice Palace in St. Petersburg, Russia. It’s expected to air on pay-per-view.

Emelianenko recently left Strikeforce following consecutive losses to Fabricio Werdum, Antonio Silva and Dan Henderson. Since then, the Russian recently has competed overseas, where he picked up victories over Jeff Monson and Satoshi Ishii in late 2011. The Rizzo fight is his first of 2012.

Despite his recent setbacks with Strikeforce, Emelianenko once was the most celebrated heavyweight – perhaps the most celebrated competitor in any weight class – in MMA. As part of his legendary PRIDE run, when he held the title from 2003 to 2006, he won 27 consecutive fights (with one no-contest) while building an aura of invincibility.

Emelianenko’s notable wins have come over the likes of Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Mark Coleman, Kevin Randleman, Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic, Tim Sylvia and Andrei Arlovski, among others. Many of the opponents were in the prime of their careers.

However, due to a contentious relationship between the UFC and Emelianenko’s management, the fighter never competed in the UFC, which has housed most of the world’s top heavyweights since PRIDE’s collapse.

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